by Dante King
A moment later, she had two tentacles pinning my arms above my head, two others gently stroking my nipples, and several more stroking my thighs. I could have broken her grip, but I had no desire to do so. Then, she guided me inside of her and rode me hard enough to hurt. She led me higher than I’d ever been before, and gave me a gorgeous view every step of the way as her body worked it.
Afterward, I dressed and waited for Beatrix to recover. She lay on the floor breathing hard with her tentacles splayed out like the blades of a fan. Every now and then she let out a moaning sigh, followed by a little chuckle. Several minutes later, she stood, kissed me again, and dressed.
I opened the door, ready to tell the others what I’d found, but I stopped short when each of them gave me a knowing smile. I guessed Beatrix had been louder than I’d thought. I coughed to hide a laugh.
“I found some more Void-tech,” I said to Reaver and Nyna, who were enviously watching the ruffled-up Beatrix come out of the room after me. “Come help me check it out. We’ll need to choose stuff for the rest of our team, too, including Yaltu and Enra back at the Ish-Nul village.”
“You found that much stuff?” Nyna asked. When she walked into the room, she crossed her arms and nodded approvingly.
“Damn,” Reaver echoed as she turned to Beatrix. “No wonder you got excited. This makes me want to jump his bones too!”
Both women turned to me and smiled. I looked forward to our next break.
“I don’t know what all of this is,” Nyna said, “but that’s part of the fun, you know?It’s like a puzzle with several different solutions, and each one makes a different piece of art when it’s done.
“For instance,” she said, holding up an ebony, multi-flanged mace, “while this looks like a bashing weapon, I bet it was a key to a really big lock somewhere. You want it?” She held the heavy weapon out for Reaver with both hands.
“I’m good.” Reaver was holding Clarent, her twin-bladed weapon. In its undeployed configuration, it looked like a simple, silver scepter.
“I want it,” Beatrix said breathlessly.
She took the proffered weapon, swung it a few times to check its balance, and did the same with her trusty warhammer in her other hand. She made a face like she wasn’t sure which she wanted to choose.
“May I?” I asked, holding out a hand.
She placed the mace in it, and I was immediately impressed. The weapon was the right length, maybe a few inches longer than her current weapon. It was well-balanced, which made recovery from a swing easier and more efficient. The only thing it was lacking was pizzaz.
I turned the mace over in my hands a few times, and when I discovered a hemispherical socket in the pommel, felt my face stretch into a broad smile.
“What?” Beatrix asked, stepping closer.
She stared at it for a few seconds, then slowly lifted her eyes to mine.
“Do you think it was meant for one?” she asked.
“Only one way to find out,” I answered.
I handed it and a Fex to her.
Beatrix hesitated for a moment before she pressed the power source into the weapon’s socket. At first, nothing happened, but then, claw-like hooks extended from the pommel, holding the Fex in place.
“I can sense its power,” Beatrix whispered.
She gave it a slow swing, but nothing happened.
“Try it on the door,” I told her.
She walked to the door and struck the metal gently. The silver metal buckled and screeched like it had been struck several times harder. The door tilted, its top hinge broken.
“Oh, yes,” she said, “I like this one.”
Timo-Ran watched from just outside the doorway. Beatrix stared at her new weapon as she handed her old one to him.
The bearded man took the glowing hammer, gave it a few experimental swings, and grinned broadly.
“I accept,” he said. “And thank you.”
“This,” Nyna said, pointing to the rack beside her, “is almost certainly armor. I bet it’s stronger than it looks.”
She held the vest-like thing out to me, but even from ten feet away, I could tell it would be too small.
Nyna noticed as well, so she held it up to herself, and put it on. It was a perfect fit.
“Here,” Reaver said, “try this one.”
She was holding up another, much larger vest. I slipped it over my head. It was a perfect fit. How far did the Lakunae’s tentacles reach into this world?
Nyna reached into her colorful backpack and retrieved Spirit-Watcher.
“Let’s see if this helps,” she mumbled, looking around for a while. “Nope,” she finally said as she stuffed them back into her bag. “There’s too much information here. Too many things, I guess. Plus, there’s so much technology in the next room, I’m getting data from that, too. Maybe there’s a way to tone it down a bit so that I can only see the things I want to see. I’ll figure it out later.”
She sighed and went straight back so scanning the room.
“This,” she said as she held up what looked like a deep shadow, “is, um, oh, it’s a cloak. Yaltu likes cloaks, so I’ll give it to her. No idea if black’s her color, though. We’ll see.”
“And these,” Nyna said, holding what appeared to be five-fingered gloves, one in each hand, “look like stylish gloves. Well, I needed a pair of gloves, I guess.”
She put them on and planted her hands on her hips. She opened her mouth to say something but hesitated, then slowly turned her eyes toward her waist.
“That was weird,” she said.
“What was weird?” Reaver asked, slightly alarmed.
“When I touched my waist, for a second, I thought I could see something.”
Nyna slowly walked from the room and laid her hand on a small cylindrical object on a -table just outside the door in the next room. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head for a moment, then she gasped.
“Yup,” she whispered. “That was a rush. These are mechanics' gloves, for sure. When I touch things, I can sort of see the circuitry. For instance, this part,” she said, holding up the object, “is completely busted. It was some sort of cooling device.”
“Nice,” I said. “That’s going to a be useful trick.”
If we knew for sure what could and what couldn’t be repaired, we could intervene at exactly the right moment and not carry along stuff that would turn out to be useless to us. With those gloves, I also hoped we could get a final verdict on Skrew’s mech.
“Now, this is something I could use,” Reaver piped up as she gripped an odd-shaped Void-pistol. She pointed at the far corner of the room. “It’s kind of weird, but I bet it’s powerful.”
I tossed her a Fex, which she inserted into the grip before inspecting the weapon again.
“It doesn’t seem to have a trigger,” she complained.
A moment later, she clicked something with her opposite hand and flinched when the pistol’s barrel silently extended a full yard, a stock popped out of the other end, and a scope snapped into place on top.
“Oh,” she said with a laugh, “it’s not a pistol. And there’s the trigger.”
Immediately, Nyna burst back into the room.
“So, I found this thing out there,” she babbled, “I mean, I found a lot of things, but nothing like this one. At first, I thought it was broken, but it’s not. Well, it was, but nothing bad. It needed a new power cell. So, at first, I was like, where am I going to get a new power cell for this thing, right? Then, I remembered that there are a lot of things out there, so there’s probably a power cell that would fit, right? So, then—”
“Nyna,” I said softly, “relax. Tell us what’s going on. What did you find?”
“It’s a… scanner, I guess,” she said a little slower. “Anyway, we’ve got trouble coming. Five troubles to be more precise. All headed this way fast.”
I quickly joined her and took the device. It looked like a datapad, something the Martian Storm Marines used all the time. It was
a portable computer capable of transferring data to and from a central information source quickly and efficiently.
Displayed on the screen were five icons. A glowing red line behind them indicated their origin—Brazud. A green, blinking dot in the center of the pad showed our own location.
I tapped one of the red icons, and it changed to a wireframe diagram of the inbound enemy vessel. It was a new one to me, but the design was unmistakable. It was Xeno.
“Did I bring them?” she asked, hands on her mouth.
I tapped the screen again and studied the icons for a second.
“No,” I concluded. “Based on their speed and how far they’ve traveled so far, they left more than an hour ago. My guess is that the sand-creature called them in. It’s probably telepathic. I bet the Xeno gave it to Tortengar to spie on him, just like he was spying on the bureaucrats. So they’ve been informed, and now, they’re coming.”
The room grew silent as everyone waited for me to continue, to tell them how we were going to resolve this situation. And I knew what had to be done.
“Get the people ready,” I said to Timo-Ran. “Equip as many as you can. You aren’t going to have a lot of time for training. No time, in fact. So, try to find people who already have weapons experience. If we fail, the Xeno will be on you in no time. Do not surrender. They don’t understand surrender. They’ll kill all of you or take you as slaves. They have no mercy. They’re animals and cannot be reasoned with. Also, they’re smart, so don’t underestimate them. Now, go!”
Timo-Ran nodded once, grabbed an armful of rifles, and ran through the barracks and up the stairs.
Chapter Fourteen
I would have preferred more time to prepare, but the Xeno had five of their ships on the way. My advantage was that I would choose the battleground.
I carried Nyna up to the throne room as fast as I could. We had no time to lose. She gasped at the mess we’d made on the floor as I set her down.
“That’s a lot of gold,” she whispered. “Are those diamonds? Those are diamonds, right?”
“Focus,” I said. “Where’s the hovership Tortengar was going to use to escape? We have to take the battle to them, the citizens aren’t ready for a fight.”
She pointed at the ceiling.
“How do we get in?” I asked.
“Oh, right.” She pulled Spirit-Watcher out of her bag and looked around for a moment before pointing to the throne. “It’s behind that ugly, broken chair. But it looks like we’ll need to fix something. There’s a ladderwell behind it that goes up into the ship.”
I marched to the broken throne as Reaver, Skrew, and Beatrix entered. A second later, I ripped the throne from its mounts and yanked a gaudy tapestry from the wall. There was a heavy-looking metal door with a glowing keypad in its center behind it.
“Oh,” Nyna said, “I can—”
She stopped talking when I punched the door, grabbed a buckled edge, and ripped it out of the way.
“Or, you can just do that,” Nyna added blankly.
“Let’s go,” I said.
The ladderwell was barely wide enough for my shoulders to fit through. It opened straight into the interior of the ship.
The lights were on, but it was silent inside. It was clearly of a later generation than Skrew’s mech. Based on what I could see, I estimated it to be about 30 feet long and equally wide, not accounting for any armament it may have had or the weapon pods. It was big, but not so big it wouldn't fit out of the escape hatch.
“The pilot’s seat should be that way,” Nyna said from beneath me. “Let me squeeze past, and I’ll get her warmed up.”
I pressed my body against the bulkhead to give her as much room as possible. Still, she managed to get stuck going past and had to brush her slender waist against me as she passed. She pretended to stop momentarily to inspect something when her perfect, perky boobs reached my face, stretching her arms up toward the supposed point of interest toward the ceiling, then continued on.
“Eww,” Skrew said from the bottom of the ladderwell. The others laughed.
“Yup,” Nyna said, “found it. This thing’s got six guns. Damn, that’s a lot of firepower. Everyone, pick one and strap yourselves in. Tortengar spared no expense on this thing.”
I found two tiny gun pods behind the pilot’s seat. They were belly-guns, and the job of their gunners was to shoot anything in front of, behind, or underneath the ship. The others squeezed into similar pods on other parts of the ship. A second later, the craft shuddered and began to hum.
“Cool,” Nyna said. “Unlocking the escape hatch. Let’s call it an attack hatch because we aren’t really escaping, am I right? Alright, warming the systems now. Weapons should come online in a—”
The ship shook three times, and the movement was accompanied by the sound of capacitors recharging.
“Oops,” Skrew said. “Found the pew but maybe did shoot the pew. Yup, did shoot the pew.” His voice came from a speaker hidden in the seat I’d strapped myself into.
“I heard that,” Reaver’s voice said. “Keep your booger hook off the bang switch until you see an enemy ship, Skrew. These cannons are powerful, and you’re lucky you didn’t bring the place down on our heads. Can everyone hear me?”
“I can,” I said, and the others affirmed too.
“Neat,” Nyna said excitedly. “This is a badass ship. I think I can fly it too!”
Nobody said anything in response, but I was pretty sure we were all thinking the same thing. You think you can fly it? You’re not sure?
Well, we’d come this far, and we had no other plan.
“Wow,” Nyna continued. “This thing is way overpowered. It’s got two Fex powering it. Should make the guns recharge faster, though, so shoot to your heart’s content—after we’re in the air and see the enemy, Skrew. Let’s do this!”
Her enthusiastic battle cry was accompanied by a violent reverse thrust and a sudden stop.
“Everything’s fine,” she said. “No problem. Up is down, down is up, and so on. That’s all. I’ve got this.”
A moment later, we were rising into the sky.
A small square panel in front of me lit up, and the lights on a flight yoke illuminated. I took hold and managed to almost instantly invert myself. It took a few tries, but I figured out the controls quickly. Based on the grunts and curses from the rest of the gunners, it sounded like we were all new to the control and targeting system.
“Everyone fire three shots where it’s safe,” I ordered. “We need to know if your gun works or not. If not, you can move to a working one.”
The ship shuddered as angry yellow bolts of superheated air destroyed boulders, hillsides, and, in my case, caused a rockslide into an unoccupied valley. I marveled at the power I held at my fingertips. There was no way the Xeno would last long against us. They were in for a surprise.
“Skrew loves pew-pew gun,” the vrak whispered. “Is such power. Very kaboom. Make Xeno plenty dead.”
He giggled, and the sound sent shivers up my spine. I was glad he was on our side.
Nyna cranked up the speed, and soon the landscape beneath us was nothing but a blur.
“The red blips look like they’re about a minute out,” she said. “They’re turning toward us. I’m going to slow down so we can meet—oh shit, get ready, here they are!”
The ship braked abruptly, sending me slamming into the front of my harness, and with that wake-up call, we were in battle. When I’d regained my bearings, I could see them. I squeezed the trigger on the yoke and brought the gun around as I chased one of the Xeno vessels. It was shaped like a crescent, but one end was slightly bulged. I guessed it was the cockpit. Two more zipped past, chased by yellow hyphens.
“Shoot where they will be when your shots are out, not where you see them!” I barked. “Shoot in their path, and they’ll run into your weapons fire!”
The next small craft took a hard hit near its center and began to vent smoke, but it wasn’t out of the battle. For a mome
nt, I caught sight of a much larger Xeno ship, before ours banked hard to the left, then right, then performed a barrel roll.
“Sorry,” Nyna said. “We had one on our ass. I shook it loose, though.”
The big ship came into view again. It was headed toward us but didn’t look like it was moving as fast as the others. Nor did it seem as maneuverable.
“Looks like a small carrier,” Reaver said.
“That’s what I was thinking,” I said as I opened up on another small craft but missed it by a fraction of an inch.
I grunted as the ship shook hard.
“We’re hit!” Nyna said. “But we’re still good. Damn. They’re shooting some kind of beam at us!”
Another small craft cut in front of us and fired green beams from its center. Yellow energy bolts shot all the way around it, and I saw my opportunity. I waited until I was sure, then pulled the trigger and sent four well-aimed blasts through the cockpit. The Xeno vessel exploded and disappeared in a black cloud.
Another came around, flew through the cloud, and headed right toward me. I pulled the trigger, as did two other gunners, and tore the craft to shreds. For a moment, I saw the pilot as his craft fell apart around him. He had two arms, two legs, and looked very human. He was also wearing a Martian Navy uniform. My breath caught in my throat.
They’ve been infected, just like Demetrios, the former king of Brazud, I realized. Demetrios was nothing more than a skin. The parasite was using it like a costume. My crew have become zombies doing their sworn enemies’ bidding.
A hard jolt spun our ship and slammed my head against the bulkhead, interrupting my horrified stare. I touched the spot, looking for blood, but there wasn’t any. The bulkhead had a dent in it though.
“Damn!” Nyna hissed. “That was a hard hit. It’s the big ship. It’s joined the fight. We can outrun them if you want. Or we can fight. But that thing’s a monster!”
A barrage of green bolts lanced up from somewhere beneath our ship and caused us to lose power for a moment and drop. It felt like my stomach might hit my eyeballs before Nyna recovered and took evasive maneuvers. She grunted as she fought to shake off our pursuer. I felt her increase, then decrease the throttle.